


Chronology

by quinnovative



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Angst, Big Sister Alex Danvers, Big Sister Maggie Sawyer, Danvers Sisters, F/F, Gen, Sanvers - Freeform, Time Travel, maybe a little hurt/comfort later
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-08
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-01-10 22:41:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12309375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quinnovative/pseuds/quinnovative
Summary: Based on this prompt: Time is altered and now Alex isn't Kara's sister. It's up to Kara to fix things."Her name is Kara Danvers and Alex is her sister.These primeval truths she has known for years—repeats them at first merely to blend in, leaving a metallic thickness in their wake, until any falseness or asterisks are stripped away by time and closeness. Until Alex’s position as her sister is as sure as anything Kara has ever known, more sure at times, than even Kara’s own name.Because her name… well her name changes depending on who you ask and when and where and how. But Alex? Alex is always, always there."(Until she isn't)





	1. Chapter 1

The streets are lit by dim lamps and DEO vans corral the area.

Her name is Kara Danvers and Alex is her sister.

These primeval truths she has known for years—repeats them at first merely to blend in, leaving a metallic thickness in their wake, until any falseness or asterisks are stripped away by time and closeness. Until Alex’s position as her sister is as sure as anything Kara has ever known, more sure at times, than even Kara’s own name.

Because her name… well her name changes depending on who you ask and when and where and how. But Alex? Alex is always, always there.

Alex is the one she runs to, the one she’s running to when a flash of purple cracks across the night sky and the universe is whirling in Kara’s ear and she can’t hear her sister screaming, can’t hear J’onn telling her to get away, not to touch the sparking, screeching technology dropped from an alien ship during the fight. All she knows is that Alex is always, always there, and the metal is catching fire, deep magentas and soft lavenders licking up at the dark sky and Alex is pinned under debris just a foot away from the flame.

If Kara dives she’ll make it in time, will manage to wedge her body between Alex and the wailing tech.

So she does.

Kara throws herself forward, yelling her sister’s name and there’s a crash and a boom and the ground shakes and Kara feels the solar energy blast out in protest from her cells, feels her powers seep away and it hurts in her bones, in the pit of her stomach, in the back of her skull.

A gush of wind yanks at her hair, rattles her ribs.

Sunlight assaults her eyes when she opens them and a hand comes up to cradle her forehead before she can even think. She closes her eyes again and her body tingles like every limb is asleep, like she’s run a thousand miles and her lungs can’t catch up.

She blindly pushes against the ground, trying and failing to keep her eyes open, tips toward her side instead as nausea simmers in her stomach.

The axis of the world feels like it’s been slanted a few degrees.

“Whoa hey, ma’am, you should probably stay lying down right now.”

The voice curls inside her head, sooths something of the pounding there in its familiarity. Kara strains, eyes squeezed shut as she combs through letters in her brain, tries to put together a name to accompany this voice that she knows so well.

“Here, there you go,” the voice says and Kara feels hands on her shoulders lower her back to the ground. She feels gravel press through fabric and moves to smooth her cape down beneath her. She gropes at the space above her shoulder and her eyes snap open.

There is nothing there.

She looks down, her super suit has been replaced by a pantsuit and a silk white blouse, coated in dirt and a splotch of blood.

Her heart races, beats against her ribcage. “W-what happened?” she manages and her mouth is dry, tongue against her teeth and tripping over words. She barely recognizes her own voice through the clanging in her skull and the swimming blurs of cityscape warped behind her eyes.

 “There was an explosion. You were in the wrong place at the wrong time, but paramedics are on their way, okay? You’re going to be just fine.”

Kara eases upward again and tries to turn toward the voice, but the sun is too bright. It isn’t supposed to be here.

These clothes are wrong.

“Can you tell me your name?”

It’s supposed to be nighttime and she’s supposed to be in her Supergirl suit and Alex is… “ _Alex!”_ she chokes out, eyes darting around the scene. She can’t find her sister, can’t find a DEO van in sight, or the alien ship they’d been fighting.

Her breath picks up in her lungs.

“Okay, Alex, well I—“

“No!” She shakes her head and her stomach lurches in protest. “ ‘s my sister.”

“Alex is your sister? We can have the hospital call for her. Can I get your name?”

“Kara,” she says and her eyelids fall closed, voice slurring because if she isn’t Supergirl then there’s only one other person she can be. “Kara D-”

Her eyes are closed but colors are spinning behind them, she falls backward.

“Hey careful, stay with me all right, kid?” The woman reaches for her hand, gives it a gentle squeeze. “Just a few more minutes.”

 “Kar-Kara Danvers.”

_Maggie._

Kara fights her mouth to stay open at the revelation but it won’t and the thought is too heavy and a wayward tear streams forward and consciousness fleets from her as easily, as seamlessly and inevitably, as daytime into night.

The other woman’s brows crease in confusion and she lets go of the hand, an ice cold chill sprints down and settles in her core as she turns to spot one of her colleagues. “How far out is that ambulance? I think we’re dealing with a TBI… or something… something else, something more maybe.”

“Less than a minute, Detective Sawyer.”

/

“What have we got?” she asks and an intern falls in step at her side, tilting a clipboard in her direction.

Their steps sync, echoing through the bustling hospital corridor.

“Twenty six year old female, likely TBI, some signs of retrograde amnesia, came in from the explosion just a few blocks over. Detective Sawyer was the one who called it in.”

“Oh really?”

“Yep. She was on scene, there was extraterrestrial activity associated with the incident. Patient was unconscious upon arrival but shows signs of waking.”

“Hmm, charts?”

The intern hands over the papers as they turn a corner.

“Thanks.”

In the room at the end of the hall, bright lights bleed into Kara’s consciousness for the second time that day. Kara hears her sister’s presence before she feels or sees it. The gentle hum greets her ears, floats above the rest of the hospital clatter and rouses the blonde from sleep.

Kara shifts and the ache in her head forces her eyes back closed, tells her that her powers are still lacking.

“Huh… interesting.” The woman pauses outside the door and looks up. “Did Sawyer tell you this?” She drags her finger across the line at the bottom of the page in the box titled ‘notes.’

The intern murmurs the end to herself. “Given name didn’t match ID on person’… Yeah she’s the one that heard it along with a bunch of other weird shit the patient was mumbling subconsciously.You got a cousin we don’t know about, Dr. Danvers?”

Alex laughs, tucks a loose strand of hair behind her own ear and passes the clipboard back. “Guess we’re about to find out, has her family been contacted yet?”

“Other than you?” The intern gives a cheeky grin and Alex rolls her eyes.

“Funny.”

Kara’s heart sinks with the weight of planetary gravity, screams inside her chest and she bites her bottom lip to fend off tears.

Something is wrong, wrong, wrong.

“They’re working on it right now,” the intern relents and reaches for the door. “You ready?”

Alex nods. “Let’s see what we can do.”

Kara sucks in a deep breath and watches her heartrate climb on the monitor, and when the door opens, the pain in Kara’s head is nothing to catch sight of her favorite person in the universe. With her standing there, cracking open the door with a soft smile and lab coat over her shoulders, Kara can only think _I love you, I love you, I love you._

Alex freezes in the doorframe as something intangible washes over her, as images under her consciousness beats up against her brain: a flicker of sunshine through a window looking down at someone; something soft and blue beneath her fingers, a person pressed warm against her side.

“—for real, Dr. Danvers?”

“Huh?” she whispers back.

“You know her?”

Alex shakes her head, crinkles her brow in a way that parallels the blonde lying in the bed across from her. “No.” She dismisses the sentiment and steps into the room, closing the door behind her.

“Hi,” she makes her way toward the hospital bed, trying to shake the nagging inside her. “I’m Dr. Danvers, I’ll be taking care of you, okay?”

Kara nods and swallows a watery laugh because some things never change—not in different universes or timelines or whatever the hell this is. She shakes her sister’s outstretched hand and just barely manages to choke out a “Kara” because the hand feels almost the same, warm and slightly smaller than Kara’s. But it lacks callouses from weapons and DEO training, callouses that had to form because of Kara.

Her finger grazes the cool metal band of a ring and her eyes snap upward to the ID badge dangling from Alex’s lab coat. Her heart lifts at the picture smiling back at her and beneath it: Dr. Alex Danvers-Sawyer.

She bites the inside of her cheek, tears rising.

“Hey, it’s okay.” Alex’s hand settles on her shoulder and it’s the same, it’s the same. It’s all the same but it’s not. “I heard you’ve been having some memory problems, right?”

Kara shrugs and drops her gaze because she can’t look into those familiar brown eyes any longer.

“Well don’t worry, you’re in good hands. We’re going to run a few tests, check for a concussion among other things, so just let me know if you have any questions while we go or if anything’s not feeling good.”

Kara nods, no longer trusting her words.

It’s over two hours later when she’s alone in the room again. She twists the edge of the hospital sheet, draws it up toward her face and brushes it across her cheeks, her nose, because it smells faintly of Alex and if Kara closes her eyes for a single piece of a second, she’s home.

A knock on the doorframe jostles inside Kara’s head and she blinks, shifting upward as she rubs her eyes. The room is shrouded in the blue shadows of dusk and without meaning to, she’d slept for hours.

“Kara?” A nurse cracks open the door and pops her head in. “We got in contact with your family, you up for visitors?”

Kara nods, straightening her posture to try and look over the woman’s shoulder. “She’ll be here in a minute,” the nurse says. “I just have to go grab her from the waiting area.”

Kara gives a small tilt of her chin and twirls the hem of the blanket between her thumb and pointer finger, rubs the fabric back and forth until the friction breeds heat and pinkness.

The door swings closed and when it opens moments later Kara feels her whole world crumble and crack in her chest. Her fingers freeze and her knuckles go white gripping the hospital sheet and her voice is heavy.

She chokes over her words and coughs.

Her eyes are wet before she can even blink.

“Aunt Astra?”


	2. Chapter 2

The nurse closes the door behind her, leaving the pair alone and Kara scrambles out of the bed. Her feet aren’t fast enough to close the distance, wouldn’t be even if she had her powers. The sheets tangle between her legs and send her tripping forward.

She should fall, but instead, Astra’s arms are there.

With her Kryptonian strength, Astra easily holds Kara up, pulling her into a hug so that for a moment her feet don’t touch the ground and she’s freed from the mass of sheets that drops to the ground and settles with a soft thump; for a moment she isn’t more than twelve years old. She curls her arms into an embrace around Astra’s neck, balanced on her tiptoes and presses her face into the raised line of her aunt’s collarbone. Kara breathes in her scent, soaks up the heartbeat pressed against her and fills her fingers with soft curls. With her eyes closed and her sense full of these wonderful, minute, colossal ghosts for just a moment, Kara doesn’t have only her aunt back, but her mother, too, her planet. For just a moment, it’s enough.

It’s enough to make her never want to leave this twisted, titled timeline.

“You remember me?”

“I could never forget you,” Kara says, not thinking about the circumstances or context.

“I missed you.” Astra’s lips brush against Kara’s hair and she hugs her closer.

Kara swallows hard, closing her eyes and trying to hold tighter. “You have no idea”

 “Little One,” Astra begins and pulls back to look Kara in the eyes, brushing blonde hair behind her ear. “You frightened me. I flew as soon as I heard the call.”

Kara ducks her head as her face falls, wants to let herself believe for just a second that this part of the timeline is real. A whimper breaks forward and then the tears fall, slip down her cheeks and onto Astra’s shoulder in sync with the gentle hand rubbing up and down her back.

“It is okay, Little One. It’s okay.” Astra murmurs into Kara’s ear and it sends her diaphragm heaving in time with the strength of her cries.

“W-what’s… Where are we? What happened, Aunt Astra? What’s _happening_?”

“Oh, my sweet Kara. You were here for a conference, we’re in National City right now. There was an accident, you were injured,” she leans closer, lowers her voice to a whisper, “I didn’t know that could happen with your powers, but you haven’t used them for years and I know that’s my fault, I am sorry, Kara.”

“I don’t,” she hiccups and wipes at her cheeks. “I don’t understand.”

“Do not worry, it will come with time.” Astra walks them back to the bed, moves to ease Kara onto the mattress but the blonde clings to her aunt.

Kara swallows over a lump in her throat, stays quiet hugging Astra, trying to preserve her warmth and touch and features to memory.

“Aunt Astra?” she says after minutes pass.

“Yes, Little One?” Astra brushes a hand over Kara’s hair.

“I love you.”

“I love you, too. So much.”

Kara smiles, sniffling. “Will you stay?” She closes her eyes. “Just for a little if you can?”

“Of course.” Astra kisses Kara’s temple. “The nurse informed me that she’s going to bring in some personal items that you had with you, see if anything sparks some recognition. They’re going to let me stay the night with you.”

Kara nods and has to remind herself that none of these memories will be real, nothing within her reach is real in this moment.

/

“Damn it!” Alex growls in the empty lab, slamming her hand against the counter before crumpling up the next page of results. She shoves away from the table to throw out the sheet, and a rack of test tubes shakes, clinking against one another.

Alex freezes, sure that one is going to break against the file cabinet.

“Hey, easy over there.”

Alex’s head whips toward the door, where her wife is leaning against the frame. Maggie looks back at her, brows raised and arms crossed.

“Hi,” Alex offers as Maggie walks over.

“Hey.” The detective curls her arms around Alex from behind, hugging her close as Alex’s shoulders ease out of their tensed hold and she releases a heavy breath.

“How’d you get them to let you in here?”

Maggie shrugs and Alex feels it on her back. “You were supposed to be home over an hour ago.”

Alex pulls out of Maggie’s embrace and turns around, grabbing both her hands instead. “It’s—‘

“Past nine already? Yeah.”

“Damn it.” Alex heart drops in her chest. “What about Jamie?”

“The sitter’s still with her, promised I’d pay extra for staying late.”

“Maggie, I’m so sorry, I—“

“Save it, okay? What’s going on? You’ve been acting weird all day.”

Alex tugs her hand away from Maggie and rubs her forehead, looking down at the ground. “Jamie’s really going to hate me after this… shit, Maggie, I was getting so close. She’s going to be distant again isn’t she? I really messed up, I…”

“Hey Danvers, cut it out. It’ll take time, you just need practice and consistency, okay? You haven’t had any experience with this kind of thing. And while I’m pissed that you forgot to come home for her, I want to know why, before I say anything else. So, what the hell is going on? I haven’t been able to get in touch with you since this morning.”

Alex glances around the lab and takes Maggie’s hand, guiding her out of the room, down the hall, into the elevator. The silence threatens to take over, but Alex squeezes Maggie’s hand as the floors pass, tugging her forward when they reach the highest floor and switch elevators to get onto the rooftop.

A sweep of her eyes confirms that the area is empty so Alex steps out, walks them toward two old chairs, outlined with battery powered Christmas lights that flicker when jostled.

“Damn, you come here often?” Maggie asks as they sit, looking out at the skyline, made visible by glowing yellow windows and moonlight.

“Shut up, Sawyer,” Alex says, glancing over to see a smirk on her wife’s face and feeling one spread across her own. “If I remember things correctly, I did propose to you up here, didn’t I?”

Maggie shrugs, squeezes Alex’s hands where they’re still clasped together. “You might have, that sounds a little familiar.”

Alex smiles and Maggie shoots her a wink. “So what’s going on, babe? I’m serious, you can talk to me.”

“I…” Alex drops her head, peeks out at the city ahead through dark lashes. Maggie runs her thumb over the back of Alex’s hand, gives it another squeeze. “I shouldn’t say this… I shouldn’t even talk about it, but that girl? The one who came in earlier, with you?” Alex raises her gaze to look at Maggie and the detective nods.

“I just have this weird feeling about the situation.”

“Like?”

“Like I really do know her.” Alex pulls her hand away from Maggie, tucks her arms across her chest instead. “I know it sounds crazy, I just—“

Maggie shakes her head. “Not crazy.”

“I keep seeing things when I’m with her, even when I so much as pass her room or close my eyes… they’re like… like snapshots from another life and then she was saying my last name as her own like we’re related or something but I called my parents and there’s no Kara Danvers in my family tree but I _feel_ something and I can’t shake it. I, this must sound stupid…”

“Alex?” Maggie runs a hand up and down her back.

“Yeah?”

“When I was on the crime scene and I was with her, a few minutes had passed and she was fading. I couldn’t be sure if she was conscious or not, but she kept mumbling something and I thought I was just hearing it because it couldn’t be right… because this… this woman I’ve never met in my life muttered my first name after saying yours, and she shouldn’t have known that. And her _voice…_ ”

“It’s like you’ve heard it before?!” Alex turns to face Maggie, her whole body shifting.

“Exactly.” Maggie nodded.

“Her tests are all coming back wrong,” Alex says. “I know I’m not supposed to talk about that, but they’re a mess. They don’t seem right, there’s something foreign almost… in her cells, in her makeup… I have to figure this out. She could be… how does she know these things? It’s…” Alex hangs her head again, curls her fingers around her wife’s hands. “I’m scared, Maggie.”

“You don’t have to be.” Maggie lifts Alex’s hands and presses a kiss to her knuckles. “But you’ve been at the hospital for over fourteen hours today, you need to rest at some point.”

“I will,” Alex promises. “Just give me another hour or two and tell Jamie I’m so sorry, I know I really screwed up again.”

Maggie nods, standing up. “Come home soon, okay? I miss you.”

“I miss you, too.”

Maggie turns around, a few steps away from entering the elevator, knowing Alex needs a few moments to think before going back to work. “And remember, Danvers, it’s about the people, not the numbers. Those pages don’t always tell the whole story.”

Alex nods and takes a deep breath. When she finally stands, Maggie is gone and the rooftop is silent save the howling rustle of wind that carries through the night.

/

“Anything?”

Kara shakes her head, sifts through the box and pulls out an ID card. She trails her finger across the name: Kara Zor-El.

There isn’t a sound in the room, just bated breathes between her and Astra with the box settled between them.

Kara swallows a lump in her throat. “They weren’t afraid my name would give me away?”

“They?”

“The people who raised me,” Kara clarifies and her features twist in confusion, head tilting to the side. “Who… who did raise me, Aunt Astra?”

“It was just me,” Astra answers and guilt washes over her face. “It was just the two of us together, I didn’t think about that at the time… Our whole worlds had just slipped from our hands, we had nothing and then we were here on Earth.”

“The Phantom Zone?”

“You remember?” Astra sits up straighter as she says it.

“I know I was there, but for how long?” She asks, it has to be different, Alex is even older than normal here, she’s—

“It must have been about twenty eight, twenty nine years for you, I can’t be certain, I…”

“Fort Rozz.”

Astra nods and suddenly she’s silent again, twisting her hands together.

Kara reaches out, spreads her palm against Astra’s knuckles. “It’s okay. I don’t care about that, I mean… you raised me. You… you’ve always been more than that, more than what happened on Krypton.”

“We got pushed out of the Phantom Zone together, at the same time, crashed here together. It was always us together.”

Kara nods. “I bet you were good,” she looks up with a smile, tears glimmering in her eyes. “At raising me. It would have been nice to have each other, pieces of home, not being so alone…”

“I should have been better.”

“You were grieving. For many years, I’m sure.”

“You needed someone else, you needed more. I should have been better.”

“You were always the best aunt.” Kara says. Her face crumples.

“Oh, Little One, what’s wrong?”

Kara shakes her head, tenses as Astra attempts to pull her into a hug.

“This isn’t right,” the blonde murmurs, through thick, murky tears that choke her throat and tighten around her chest. “This isn’t real.” She misses Alex. She misses her home. She misses putting these feelings behind her and pretending that they don’t still hurt.

“What do you mean, Kara?”

“I don’t belong here. I’m not—I love you Aunt Astra, more than I can ever say—but I don’t belong here, this isn’t me. It isn’t real. It’s… it’s not and I can’t keep pretending.”

Astra pulls back from Kara, looks into her blue eyes, reflecting light in the tears that spill from the edges. “I’m sorry, I’m afraid I do not understand. I-“

The door bursts open and both pairs of eyes snap in its direction. Alex shoves the door closed with a hand gripping crunched papers.

She locks eyes with Kara and there is nothing soft in her gaze. She’s raises a finger, pointing as her voice shakes.

“You’re not human.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry it took me so long to get this last chapter out.

Every muscle in Kara’s body quivers with her stillness. “I-“ She looks down at her hands, the ID card in her fingers snaps with the force of her grip, looks back up at Astra and the heartrate monitor begins shrieking against the wall.

With three strides Alex crosses the room and yanks out the plug.

Kara can feel the warmth of heat vision flicker behind her eyes, blinks and it’s gone, but the power is still there.

Alex drops the cord to the ground and turns on her heel to face Kara and Astra. “It’s in these papers,” she says and thrusts the crumpled sheets forward, pulling them back before either Kryptonian can grab them. She squints as she looks at the images and rows of numbers. “Your physical DNA doesn’t match the one attached to your ID, it explains… it explains why your last names didn’t match either, what you—what you said…” her voice shakes and the page tears at the edge. “What you said to Maggie, about… about your name, but what the _hell_ does that have to do with me? Or my wife? What do you want from us?’

Kara bites her lip.

Alex stares back and Kara can’t look up.

“I-“ Kara’s eyes are welling with tears. “I can’t explain.”

“Well try.” Alex’s voice is hard and Kara’s shoulders crumple inward and she is sinking in on herself, swallowed in disheveled white sheets.

“You’re alien,” the brunette presses.

Kara raises her eyes keeps looking down in the silence. “And?”

“And you…” Alex huffs, her footsteps treading back and forth are the only sound in the room. She stops. “You have to get out of here because it isn’t safe. I—listen, I don’t know what the hell is going on and I want you to explain it but I just… I have this feeling, I--” she squeezes her eyes closed and her shoulders drop, a mirror image of Kara’s posture. She steps forward and puts her hand on the edge of the bed. “I destroyed the results of your tests, these papers right here in my hand are the only copies left. I don’t know what you’re doing or how you ended up here but the anti-alien sentiments are strong even today… if they… if they knew…  if I reported this, like I’m supposed to, they could take you away, they could—My mom is a scientist, does a lot of work with a lot of extraterrestrial biology, and she’s seen things that they’ve done in the shadows of facilities and government buildings, it isn’t safe. But you should know all this and you… you should be impervious to injury so what… what happened? _Please_ , please just tell me what happened.”

Kara can’t tear her eyes away from her hands, with the sinking of her heart to her stomach this is the worst she’s felt here in this tortured timeline.

A second of silence holds the air taut and Kara can feel both pairs of eyes trained on her, carrying weight in different forms of the same degree.

“I’m not… I’m not from here,” she says and lets the sentence linger for a moment. “Neither are you, in… in a way. The timeline got altered… it must have been something with the alien tech on the scene. J’onn warned me, everyone warned me to be careful and I can hear them now, I can hear them when I think back but I—“ Kara’s voice cracks and she squeezes her eyes closed so tightly that it hurts. “I had to save you, you were going to get hurt, you—“

“Me?” Astra’s voice fills the gap, and Kara feels like a frigid hand is inside her abdomen, pinching and contorting and yanking at her organs. She feels like she might suffocate with the weight of broken worlds inside her.

“No,” she chokes out with a shake of her head, and she can’t look up, can’t look up. Can’t look up at those eyes that don’t shine on her Earth anymore, at those eyes that will never open again if this is all fixed.

With a pain that shreds and shakes, Kara _knows._

Knows she doesn’t want to be here. Knows she needs this to be fixed.

“You,” she whispers and it barely upsets the sterile air but Alex feels the weight of something insurmountable pressing at the back of her skull, the weight of another lifetime.

Kara looks up and piercing blue eyes link with Alex’s warm brown.

Kara looks up and Kara knows.

She needs to go home.

“You’re my sister,” Kara says, sniffling. She wipes her eyes with the back of her hand and now that she’s looked into Alex’s eyes she doesn’t want to stop because those are the same, the same, the same.

They’re already taking her home, home, home.

“Me?” Alex asks and her voice is soft.

Kara nods. “Eliza and Jerimiah took me in when I crashed down on Earth, we were teenagers. We lived in Midvale and your bedroom… your bedroom was on the second floor on the left if you’re facing the house and I… I took the guestroom down the hall and it became mine, and _we…_ we became sisters. I have to get back there, I have to… I- Aunt Astra,” Kara looks over to her aunt. “We didn’t come here together, I didn’t even know where you were for so long. Everything was so different… I-”

Astra’s hand moves, settles on the thin blanket above Kara’s leg. The contact should be settling but it burns guilt through Kara.

“It’s okay, Little One.” There is understanding in her misty eyes.

Alex blinks.

It’s almost dizzying.

The window, that sunlight, a small blonde girl in all white.

Alex blinks and Alex knows.

Kara squeezes her hands into tight fists to diffuse the pain coiled in her chest, the pressing weight between Astra and Alex, but she must trust in her truth.

Her reality.

Her nails press crescent-shaped indents into the soft skin of her palm.

She looks back at her sister.

 “I have to get home. Will you help me?”

Everything is telling her this is crazy, everything is telling her this is wrong, wrong, wrong. Everything is screaming at her to file a report and finally end this night. Everything is telling her no, except for this blonde woman in front of her.

Alex looks up, and Alex says yes.

/

“I’m going to clock out,” Alex says slowly, pacing around the foot of the bed. “And then we need to find a way to get you out of here… maybe um, maybe we can get you to the back staircase or I can get you a change of clothes and you can sneak out but they can’t see you leaving, if they see you leaving they’re going to be suspicious and they’re going to…” She blows out a breath, hand raising up to her forehead and pushing back hair. Kara knows this look, knows Alex is toeing a line, stressing herself out. “Shit, what am I doing?” Alex murmurs, screws her eyes shut so tightly it hurts.

“Hey,” Kara starts and her voice is soft and low. “Hey, it’s okay.

Alex doesn’t know why, but it slows her increasing heartrate, forces her to pause and look up as the tightness in her chest loosens just a little.

“I can fly.”

“Fly?”

Kara nods, smirking slightly at Alex’s parted lips and raised brows.

“Like Superman, but faster… You do… you do have Superman in this timeline don’t you?”

Alex nods, slowly at first and then with a tap of her palm against her thigh she begins pacing again. “Okay so you’ll fly, what about…um?” She looks over at Astra.

“She can fly too.”

“ _Okay._ Then listen, you’ve got to be careful. Stay low and in the shadows when you’re getting out of here. The window at the end of the hall faces away from the street so use that one. It will open if you twist the knob on the side and hold up the middle lever at the same time, okay? That end of the corridor will be empty for about a minute or two, so don’t go any earlier or later than I tell you.”

Kara nods.

“I’ll be… shit okay, I’ll be three blocks to your left if you’re facing away from the hospital. My car is black. You’ve got to be quick, all right? You’re sure you’re feeling okay?”

“Better now. Powers are back, too.” Kara says with a soft smile, gaze locking onto Alex’s warmly, and not for the first time that night a multitude of snapshots rapid fire behind Alex’s eyes with so much force she stumbles.

The breath she takes racks up through her lungs and her shoulders shake. The blurry illusory images she’d first seen are filling with color, sharpening.

“Alex?” That soft, sweet tentative voice. She knows she’s heard it a million of times and then some.

“Come on,” Alex says, raising her head. “I’m going to go.” Her eyes flit down to her watch. “Leave ten minutes from now.”

Then she slips through the door and lets it snap shut behind her.

“Finally getting out of here, Dr. Danvers?” A nurse quips, looking over his shoulder but Alex’s head is already down as she clocks out, gives a noncommittal hum in response.

She tries not to bounce her foot to dispense nervous energy, tries to keep her eyes focused, tries to keep her heart from tearing out of her chest.

“That whole thing was weird today, with that girl and the alien shit… man, I’m telling you that’s why we’ve got to get rid of those things. They don’t belong here. A bunch of sick freaks just here to screw us over.”

She bites her tongue and squeezes her eyes closed for a moment.

She tries not to move too fast.

“You in a rush?”

“Nope,” she pops the p and gathers her stuff.

“No seriously what’s got you moving so fast at midnight, you got plans?”

She takes a deep breath and meets his eyes, speaking slowly. “I have a wife, I have a child, and I’m going home to them.”

He squints and his frame is oriented in the doorway so she can’t get out.

“Move.”

He holds up his hands in surrender. “Geez, you don’t have to be like that. I’m just messing around.”

She rolls her eyes and pushes past him, pretends not to hear the slur he spits under his breath. There’s no time, no time, no time.

If she survives through this until morning she’ll find a way to make peace.

She quickens her pace as she walks, needs to recover the time she lost at their encounter. If she’s too slow Kara and Astra will be lingering and if a bad cop gets to them first, it’ll take a single test to reveal their alien status now that Kara’s back to full powers.

She crosses through the walkway attaching the hospital to the parking garage, jamming her finger into the elevator button. Her leg bounces as she waits and this time she lets it, slipping into the elevator before the doors are completely open. Once she’s heading downward she tugs her phone out of her bag, needing to hear Maggie’s voice and tell her what’s going on. But the device is dead and she curses, looking down at the black screen as the elevator halts to a stop and she steps out.

In the still night, every noise is magnified in her ear, the distant sound of a car starting two floors above her, a rustle of wind dragging a plastic bottle across concrete, the hum of dingy yellow streetlights. She twists the strap of her bag around her finger, walks briskly, head down and fights the urge to look up at any security cameras, to think about how this could fall apart.

Her hand curls around her door handle and she fumbles with the button on her keys to unlock the car.

“Hey!” A deep voice cuts through the darkness and her stomach drops as something icy and sticky curls in her abdomen.

She turns around, sees a figure moving in the shadows.

Her breath catches in her throat.

Something clatters at her feet. Her hand is suddenly empty.

Alex looks down, she’s dropped her keys. She sweeps them up and when she stands again, the person emerges into the light.

A heavy exhale escapes and she’s so relieved her eyes water.

“Hey,” she calls back to the security guard, hopes her voice sounds friendly, hopes it doesn’t shake. “You working the night shift these days?”

“I am. You have a good night, Dr. Danvers. Stay safe.”

“You too,” she says and the door handle creaks beneath her hand as she yanks it open, tosses her bag into the passenger seat and slips in. She tries to plug her phone into the charger but it keeps missing as her fingers shake and she tosses it aside, glancing at the time displayed on her car’s dash and noting that Kara and Astra should have left three minutes ago.

Her heart thunders in her chest and the steering wheel grows damp beneath the crushing grip of her hands as she pulls out of the parking garage.

At last, at last, at last, she’s out of sight of video cameras and colleagues. As she puts her car into park three blocks later she lets out an aching breath and drops her head against the steering wheel, feeling vaguely confident that she might throw up and knowing with certainty that she needs Maggie’s voice more than anything right now.

Just a minute or two and they should be here.

She fumbles around in the darkness, unwilling to turn on a light as she grabs the phone charger again and tries to plug it in.

Two taps on the window cause her posture to snap tight.

There’s no way Kara and Astra can be here already. She would have seen them come past the front of her car, there’s no back route or alternative.

She bites the inside of her cheek.

Two more sharp knocks.

She jerks forward and it shoves the charger into the phone and a muted white light fills the front of the car as the battery symbol appears and the light disperses and bounces back and from the side of her window reflects two green eyes.

“Dr. Danvers.”

A voice vibrates through the glass, laced with an accent she can’t quite place.

Alex can’t help but look and their eyes are locked together when it clicks. Despite every screaming instinct on the surface of her thought, Alex rolls down her window.

The voice is speaking again. “I’m—“

“Lena Luthor,” Alex cuts off. “I know who you are.” They stare at each other before Alex continues. “What the hell are you doing out here? Heiress of Luthor-Corp out strolling through alleys at night? Looking for something you can turn into your brother? Or maybe your mother this time?”

Lena swallows nausea that surges at the reference to her family. It’s to be expected and yet, it doesn’t lose its bite. “I’m here to help you.”

Alex rolls her eyes and climbs out of the car, slamming the door behind her. Standing, she now has a height advantage on the youngest Luthor. “That’s rich. Unfortunately, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Lena bites her lip and Alex’s gaze flits down to Lena’s hands where they twist together before Alex looks back up at the woman. But the Luthor’s face is passive, her eyes looking earnest as they bore holes through Alex.

“The timeline was disturbed, we both know it. The girl…”

Alex squints, feels her muscles tighten with a dormant springiness beginning to surge within them.

“Kara—“

In a single motion, Alex turns on her heel and has Lena pinned against the side of the car. She doesn’t know where the knowledge of her hand positioning or weight distribution had come from, she doesn’t know why the muscle memory spurred the action, or why irrational, hyperbolic protectiveness had swelled at the blonde woman’s name.

She doesn’t know, and yet, she does.

So she pushes Lena further against the car and leans in closer. “How the hell do you--”

“Alex! Get off of her,” Kara’s voice cuts through the night air with the scuffle of footsteps.

She’s there, pushing herself between them with more speed than a normal human should have.

Alex raises her brows, refuses to retreat at Kara’s stern gaze.

“She’s good,” Kara says it softly and Lena finds herself unable to move.

“She’s…? You’re kidding me, right? Listen, I barely know you, but I think… I get it, okay? I’m buying into this whole timeline thing, sure. Because objectively it explains a lot. But you… Kara, you’re from a different timeline, I mean you don’t know what she’s capable of here. What her family has done to… to people like…”

_People like you._

Kara casts a glance at Lena, at those green eyes she knows so well. They’re filled with unshed tears reflecting dim streetlights. There’s no shimmer behind them, but there’s no malice either. Only pain and an ocean of confusion.

And her hands, Kara watches as Lena’s hands shake and she shoves them into her coat pocket.

Kara looks back up, catches Lena’s eyes and offers her a soft smile.

She turns back to Alex. “She’s good.”

This time Astra is the one to protest first. “Kara, Little One, I know you always see the good in people, but her family—“

“Let’s hear what Lena has to say before we finish that, okay?” Kara defends, shifting on her feet so she’s angled between Lena and the other two women.

“Okay,” Astra relents with a nod.

Lena looks up and all eyes are on her.

She locks her gaze onto Kara’s and forces her voice to steady. “When you came here, it was an accident, correct?”

Kara nods.

“And there was a device, yes? When it all happened was there something metal, rounded at the edges?”

Kara nods again.

“Like this?” Lena pulls out her phone and with two swipes of her fingers, a picture emerges. Kara’s heart lurches when she sees it, the device looking insignificant and small against the white background of a lab counter but she knows its abilities now.

“And there was lots of sparking and light it was—“

“—purple,” Lena finishes.

Kara’s eyes light up. “Yeah!”

Alex furrows her brows and makes a face, jabbing Kara’s side with her elbow.

“What? That’s exactly what it was like,” Kara defends and looks back at Lena with an encouraging nod.

“Continue,” Astra demands. “What are the implications of your statement?”

“A monitor picked up a mass energy fluctuation at the scene so I looked into it and my brother, Lex—“

“We know who your brother is,” Alex cuts in. “We don’t easily forget the names of mass murderers.”

Lena bites her bottom lip, shifts her gaze downward.

Then there’s Kara’s voice again, soft and calming and increasingly familiar in ways Lena’s never known before. “It’s okay,” the blonde reassures. “Just… just keep going.”

Lena looks up and Kara’s waiting for her gaze with a soft smile, because she trusts Lena in any universe—because she knows her heart and her head and her hurt. She knows Lena and no amount of timelines or years or alien technology can change that.

“He retrieved the device from the scene of an alien ship that’d crashed onto Earth. Everyone in the ship was killed on impact but some technology was intact despite the ship being destroyed. The device was used to create wormholes for efficient space travel. The technology was flawed and that’s why the ship crashed but it was successful in the physical creation of wormholes. Lex spent years manipulating and redesigning it.”

“Why?”

“He wanted to go back and alter time so that Superman’s pod never even reached Earth. I went through his files and he eventually set the project aside after he couldn’t hone in with the degree of specificity required.”

“Oh my god,” Kara gasps.

Astra and Alex both whirl to face her. “What?”

“That’s why my pod came here differently…. It’s why I arrived here with Astra when I didn’t in my timeline, it explains the forces, the manipulated path of travel. He was really close, Lena. Really, really close. He could have—“

A scuffling of footsteps carries through the alleyway and Alex catches light reflecting off the green outlined badge of an anti-alien task force. Kara falls silent as tension radiates off Alex’s suddenly taut muscles.

“Get in the car,” she whispers, gently pushing Kara forward. “We don’t want this kind of conflict right now.”

Astra follows and Alex looks at Lena, unblinking as she looks into her eyes, studies her face.

The footsteps grow louder and Alex climbs into the driver’s seat, turns back to Lena. “Get in the car, Luthor.”

“What was that?” Kara asks as they pull out of the alley and onto the main road.

“They’re an anti-alien hate group who’ve taken it upon themselves to hunt aliens and expose them, violently, often ending in murder.”

Alex tightens her fingers around the steering wheel.

Kara furrows her brows. “Why hasn’t the government stopped them?”

“I told you, the government is part of the problem. They never outright condone the group and in doing so, they endorse it and validate that kind of behavior.”

Kara falls silent in the backseat next to Lena, watches Alex through the rearview mirror and aches to be able to hug her, to hug her Alex, back home.

“We need the device,” Lena says, breaking the silence. “I know how to reprogram it and fix the timeline.”

War wages inside Alex’s head but she looks and catches Kara’s eyes in the mirror and the blonde nods and Alex trusts her enough to trust Lena.

Alex takes a hand off the steering wheel and grabs her phone, pulling it up to her ear. “Maggie, I’m about to ask you to do something really crazy and if it’s too much just tell me and I’ll figure out another way.”

Silence stretches a beat before Alex speaks again. “I need you to steal something from the evidence locker at the precinct… the device from earlier today… no, I swear to god I’m not kidding…. Yes, I probably have lost my mind.”

She smirks in the front seat with street lights casting shadows across her features and Kara’s heart fills.

“I’m a minute away, no she won’t be alone… I’ll explain when I get home… also, I have people with me… three… I’m pulling into the driveway right now, come outside and see.”

Alex ends the call and puts the car into park in front of a cream-colored house, it’s lit suddenly as two lights by the entryway switch on and the door opens.

Kara watches as Maggie eases the door closed behind her, walks the ten steps she needs to see the other passengers as they get out of the car. Maggie’s brows raise and she walks straight to Alex, circling a hand around her wrist and pulling her to the side.

“Explain.”

So Alex does, in rushed words. She says the things that make sense and the things that don’t and she tells Maggie about the things that make her sound crazy and delusion and desperate.

“We have to help her,” Alex says softly when she finishes, tosses a glance over her shoulder to where Kara stands, in the middle with space between her and Lena and Astra, with her hands hugging herself around her stomach and her head looking down and blonde hair tumbling over her shoulder. “I can’t explain it, I just feel something.” Alex squeezes her eyes closed and the images are back, the flashes of memories and touch. “I just know that we need to help her, that what she’s saying is true. I know it sounds insane and—“

Maggie reaches out, puts a warm hand on Alex’s cheek. “Hey, it does sound pretty crazy, but remember? I told you I felt something, too, so you’re not in this alone. I’ve got to go now though because I know the feds are coming for that tech and the precinct probably doesn’t have much time with it, so I’ve got to go see how quickly I can go commit a federal offense. There’s a lot of chaos down there right now and I need to take advantage of that.”

“Badass,” Alex says and kisses Maggie’s forehead.

“Blondie over there better be right,” Maggie says. “That’s all I’m saying.”

Alex nods. “I think she is.”

“Me too.”

“This is…” Alex blows out a breath. “This is a lot.”

Maggie nods and squeezes Alex’s hand. “I love you.”

“I love you, too. Be careful, all right?”

“You too.”

Then Maggie takes Alex’s keys and gets into her car and disappears into the night.

/

Alex, Lena, Astra, and Kara are bent over the coffee table with papers spread and diagrams covering the area. Lena’s running through her calculations with Alex double checking at her side while Kara and Astra give the details they can. They’re nearing the end when the gentle patter of footsteps carries down the hall with a soft whine.

Alex stands and goes to meet the source of the noise, Lena and Astra are absorbed in confirming the last formula they need but Kara follows Alex’s movements with her gaze, watches as the brunette scoops up the small figure of a child. The girl wraps her legs around Alex’s waist, curls her arms around her neck and nestles into her collarbone, murmuring sleepily.

“Hey, bug, what’re you doing up right now? It’s late,” Alex whispers, bouncing Jamie just slightly as she walks them down the hall back to Jamie’s bedroom.

“Miss you,” the three-and-a-half-year-old murmurs around the thumb in her mouth. “Where you go? You didn’t come for me.”

Alex feels her heart splinter and holds Jamie closer to her chest. “I know, I’m so sorry, baby. I had something important at work and got wrapped up in it, but that’s not a good excuse is it?”

Jamie shakes her head and with her free hand, she twirls her fingers in Alex’s hair.

“I’m sorry, Jamie. I love you so much, forever and ever. You know that, right? No matter what.”

Jamie nods. “Love you, ‘lex,” she mutters as Alex tucks her back in bed.

“I love you, too, baby.” Alex presses kisses across her face.

“Where Maggie?” Jamie asks, snuggling into the stuffed lion Alex slides under the blanket beside her.

“She’ll be here when you wake up,” Alex says and Jamie mumbles something incoherent and Alex tries to forget that everything might be different in just a few hours.

She turns away when Jamie’s breathing slows and sees Kara standing in the doorway.

“Sorry, I just—Lena and Astra said they’re finished. So when Maggie gets back we’ll be good to go.”

“Okay,” Alex nods, runs a hand through her hair.

“She’s your… your daughter?”

“Do I not have one in your timeline?” Icy panic pulsates in Alex’s veins.

Kara shakes her head. “You and Maggie are only engaged so far, it’s a few years in the past compared to here. You’re younger there.”

“She’s adopted,” Alex whispers. “We finalized it two months ago but she’s been with us for almost a year. She was abandoned, Maggie found her while working a case. We think her parents were alien and that’s why she ended up alone, something probably happened to them.”

“So she might be…”

“An alien? Yeah,” Alex nods. “We have to be so careful. If anyone found out, they might try to take her away.”

“It’s… it’s not like that where I’m from, but I—um, I—Astra doesn’t make it. She got k—she died, in my timeline and I don’t know what to do,” Kara’s voice cracks and tears reflect the moonlight shining outside Jamie’s bedroom window and this is a decision she really needs Alex’s advice on. “Do I tell her? Do I—“

“Hey okay, come here,” Alex says and leads them out of the room, closing the door until just a sliver is open. “Is it—can I hug you?”

Kara nods and Alex pulls her into an embrace. It’s awkward at first, but then the feeling is so familiar, so comforting that the tension involuntarily eases from their bodies. “What do I do?” Kara asks, bottom lip quivering and Alex doesn’t get the chance to answer because suddenly her phone is ringing and Kara jumps back in surprise and Maggie’s name is flashing across the screen.

Alex accepts the call and her wife’s voice travels over the line. “Listen,” her voice is sharp and rushed. “I’m less than five minutes away from the house. I tripped an alarm on my way out and some officers noticed it was missing. There’s a number of squads out patrolling now. The only thing that will reveal it was me would be if they get to our house and find it. I covered everything else, so you need to be ready to use this damn thing, okay?”

“Got it. We’re ready.”

Except Kara feels anything but ready. She tears out of the hallway to tell Lena and Astra to prepare and then guilt fills her with nausea as she presses into Astra’s side and is warmed by the body heat of her aunt.

It’s all happening with dizzying speed.

She wants to say I love you and she wants to say thank you and I miss you and a million other words that aren’t enough, but her throat is too tight and tears are rising and her heart is stuttering.

So she hugs Astra and closes her eyes and tries to secure this memory one last time when Maggie throws open the door and then the device is in Lena’s hands and she’s making the final modifications. Then it’s sparking and the purple light is back. “Thank you,” Kara says to Alex and Maggie. “I’ll… I’m gonna see you soon, okay? On the other side.”

She sees Lena slinking back, pulling away from the scene in the way she used to when Kara first introduced her to Alex and Maggie and James and Winn and all her friends. “Hey,” Kara says and gently catches Lena’s hand.

She looks up into Kara’s blue eyes and both pairs are brimming with tears.

“It gets better, okay? I promise. You’re a good person and you get people that love you. You get the love that you deserve and I believe in you, okay? I really, really do.”

Lena gives the first smile Kara’s seen from her all night.

The device is shrieking now and the distant roar of sirens perks in Kara’s superhearing. She looks at Astra and squeezes her tightly into a hug. “I love you more than words could ever say. You’re the—the... You were the best aunt and I miss you. I—“

The purple flames shoot from lilac to dark lavender and there’s a crack and boom and then Kara’s vision is pitch black and air is whirling and her stomach flips and she grits her teeth. A painful tingling starts in her toes and throbs up to her head until her whole body is quaking and the solar energy is ripped from her cells again. It stretches for an eternity and just when she thinks she’s going to tear apart from the inside out, she’s spit out and tipped onto her side, crashing onto a street as gravel bites into her side.

She feels like vomiting and she feels like the earth is spiraling but her atoms feel aligned the way they’re supposed to be.

“Supergirl, what the hell!?” Alex’s voice pounds inside her head and Kara tries to open her eyes but her muscles won’t work.

The shifting of concrete grates in Kara’s ears and she recognizes J’onn’s footsteps as he helps Alex up and then she recognizes Alex’s as she runs over and kneels at Kara’s side.

Kara’s eyelids flicker open and closed and her world comes back in loud, blurry snippets.

It’s night again, with the same chill in the air as when she’d left.

“Careful,” Alex’s voice is low and calming as Kara struggles to sit up. Alex’s hands wrap around her sides, hold her steady. Then J’onn’s eases her up, flies her away from the battle to an evacuated sidewalk, marked off by DEO caution tape. He settles her down and puts Alex on her feet beside Kara with a few brief words before flying back into the fight.

“Hey,” Alex says gently as Kara’s eyelids part and stay open this time.

Kara groans and drops her head into her hands, curling over so her elbows rest on the knees pulled up to her chest.

“Hey, Kara.” Alex rubs her back and whispers now. “I need you to talk if you can. Are you okay?”

Kara nods slowly, forces herself to lift her head. “Yes,” she mutters and tears flood her eyes at the sight Alex. She’s more than okay now and it has everything to do with the sister in front of her, the sister in reach of her stinging, trembling hands.

“Oh my Rao I missed you,” she says and ignores the ache in her muscles and stomach and head to throw herself forward into Alex’s arms instead.

Alex hugs her close, fingers splayed across Kara’s back, rubbing steadily. “What happened? I saw you disappear in the flash of purple. It took three whole minutes of you missing for you to reappear. There was a black void with a ring of purple that opened up in the sky and you fell out of there, crashed into the pavement. That’s probably why you’re hurting right now. No powers?”

Kara shakes her head. “No powers.”

“So what happened? I was scared out of my mind for you.”

Kara closes her eyes and squeezes Alex, dips her head into her sister’s neck. “I’ll tell you soon, can I just—can we just go home. I’ll explain there and you can do your med check if you want, I just need to be close to you.”

“Sure,” Alex promises, presses a kiss to Kara’s pounding head. “Nothing will come between us.”

“You have no idea,” Kara says and her voice is cracking and high and laced with tears.

Alex takes her home and Alex wraps her up in bandages and blankets as they curl up on the couch. Kara tells her everything and then she cries for Astra and for Krypton and for Lena, for Maggie and Alex and beautiful broken things.

Alex holds her and puts on a movie and Kara’s asleep within minutes. A gentle knock on the door rouses her awake, still with Alex’s arms around her.

Kara starts to sit up, brows furrowed. She turns to Alex, with concern tugging at her features.

Alex shakes her head. “It’s okay, you can relax I just thought you might want to see some people.”

Kara’s head tilts toward the door as it opens and Maggie steps in with Lena behind her. “Look who I picked up,” the detective says and a smile breaks out across Kara’s lips.

She tries to stand but the motion sends waves of pain pulsating through her body. Alex gives a hand to help Kara sit again and the blonde collapses back into her sister’s warmth with a small huff of frustration.

“It’s okay, Little Danvers,” Maggie says, closing the door and balancing a bag of takeout in the other hand. Kara’s light with the people surrounding her. “You take it easy,” she says and Kara smiles, swallowing the lump in her throat. Alex’s hand is in her hair and Maggie’s stepping into the living area and Lena’s giving Kara her best, shining smile. “We’ll come to you.”


End file.
